THE VIVISECTION QUESTION. 771 



of the Holy Land. Between 1830 and 1840 he contributed many- 

 valuable articles to Silliman's Journal. 



Denison Olmsted became more widely known than either of 

 the other pioneers in science. In the course of his work at Chapel 

 Hill he gave the first geological description of the Deep River 

 coal beds, and of the accompanying New Red sandstone, and re- 

 ferred the strata correctly to the same age with the Richmond 

 coal beds and the Connecticut River sandstones. He began re- 

 searches to determine the practicability of obtaining illuminating 

 gas from cotton seed, but removed to New Haven before he had 

 secured definite results. His Natural Philosophy, which is still a 

 standard work, appeared in 1831, and his Astronomy, another 

 important work, in 1839. 



One wonders why such good beginnings should have borne so 

 little fruit ; but when we bear in mind that the institution which 

 thus early fostered science had the greater part of its endowment 

 fund swept away by the civil war, that the spirit of the South 

 since that great event has been largely commercial and industrial, 

 and that the income of the old university, from legislative appro- 

 priations, tuition fees, and endowment funds, is only forty-five 

 thousand dollars, the wonder ceases. 



THE VIVISECTION QUESTION. 



By C. F. HODGE, Ph. D., 



ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF PHYSIOLOGY, CLARK UNIVERSITY. 



III. THE UTILITY OF VIVISECTION. 



ASIDE from the highest " use of science," its satisfaction of 

 - man's intellectual wants and its influence upon his char- 

 acter, science has many " practical " values connected with its de- 

 velopment. And it is to these " uses " of physiological research 

 that we will confine attention, bearing in mind that we are ad- 

 dressing those who believe that, after duty, human health and 

 happiness are the highest values in the world, and that the 

 greatest evils in the world, after moral evil, are human suffering 

 caused by disease and premature death. 



How much "use" humanity has for help in these regards may 

 be seen from a glance at vital statistics. "Of 1,000,000 people 

 starting out in life, 497,000 will die, almost all from disease, before 

 reaching the age of forty- one." * We are losing yearly in this 

 country over 302,806 children under five years of age.t There 

 certainly is no " use " in this. 



* Albert Buck. A Treatise on Hygiene and Public Health, vol. ii, pp. 328, 329. 

 f Tenth Census Compendium, p. 1707. 



